The Mandaya/Mansaka are famous
for their distinctive costumes and ornamentation, which involves tie-dyed
textiles and embroidery using a sophisticated system of symbols with named
motifs. Beadwork and silver craft are also well-developed. Concentrated
in the towns of Caraga, Manay, Cateel, Lupon, and Tarragona, the Mandaya
live in dispersed settlements in upstream areas practicing slash and burn
cultivation. They live mainly on rice, various tubers, and bananas. Houses,
which may contain up to three family units, are spatially organized into
kinship-based neighborhoods and always placed within eyesight of each other.
Families may be nuclear or polygynous. Traditionally, each neighborhood
is ruled by a distinctively dressed headman, bagani, who receives
advice from a council of elders, angtutukay; in many areas, however,
this has been replaced by the barangay.
AKA:
Mangwanga, Mangrangan, Managosan, Magosan, Pagsupan,
Divavaonon, Dibabaon, Mansaka.
Location:
Mindanao, Davao Oriental province.
Languages:
Supergroup:
Subgroups:
Mansaka, Pagsupan, Mangwanga (Magrangan, Compostela),
Managosan (Magosan), Divavaon (Dibabaon, Mixed Manobo-Mandaya), Karaga.
Subsistence:
Wide range of swidden crops, abaca as cash
crop.
Population:
172,506 (1994)